


Serendipity and other ordinary miracles

by Amazaria



Category: One Piece
Genre: And that is to make you all accept, Franky is only barely in this though, Gen, Good job OP fandom, I tagged Strawhat Pirates and their individual names for a simple reason, I'm sorry Franky I still love you I swear, Jinbei (One Piece) written as Jinbe, Mocking your brothers' well-founded worries and other things to do when happy, Monkey D. Luffy Loves His Friends, Post-Dressrosa and assorted spoilers, Post-Marineford and assorted spoilers, That is an actual tag and I'm so glad, The author's insistent emotions about the Strawhats' friendship, The author's repeated use of miracles in their titles, some kind of fluff, that Jinbe is a Strawhat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-31
Updated: 2020-03-31
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:06:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23417176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amazaria/pseuds/Amazaria
Summary: "Well then, why didn't you answer when Usopp was calling you? That's rude, you know," calls Nami, standing next to her tangerine grove, leaves in her ponytail."Oh!" Says Luffy; just like that, his grin reappears. "I was thinking.""Thinking about what, Captain?" Says one of Robin's mouth on the mast, and Luffy looks down on the hat he still holds in his hand, the surprisingly sturdy string attached to it dangling in the air.There's a pause, as they wait for his answer."I was just thinking," says Luffy, smile still wide and eyes stuck on the part of his hat where Nami's clumsy first attempts at mending are, "I was just thinking that I'm glad I get to travel with you all."(or: in which it's a sunny afternoon, happiness is well within reach, and Luffy's doing just fine, even without his brothers by his side.)
Relationships: Monkey D. Luffy & Mugiwara Kaizoku | Strawhat Pirates, Monkey D. Luffy & Portgas D. Ace & Sabo (mentionned), Mugiwara Kaizoku | Strawhat Pirates & Mugiwara Kaizoku | Strawhat Pirates
Comments: 23
Kudos: 274





	Serendipity and other ordinary miracles

It takes Usopp maybe three weeks an a half to get his Smoke Dial to actually work, after harassing Nami for hours about the way she gets her Clima-Tact to produce clouds, and dark clouds especially.

("Don't you already have smoke bombs? That you don't use anymore, by the way? Why are you trying to turn a Dial into a smoke bomb? We don't have that much of them, you know." She had asked instead of being helpful, so Usopp had just borrowed her Clima-Tact and promised to give it a tune-up while looking for his answers.)

He finally gets the cloud to come back into the Dial - _reusable_ smoke bomb, take that, Nami!- in the middle of a sunny afternoon. The entire crew is out on the deck, for once; Nami and Robin respectively tending to their tangerine trees and flowers, Zoro napping on the grass in his usual pot, near the mast, while Usopp is seated on the bench, Chopper leaned over his shoulder to look at what the sniper is doing. Sanji's seated on the railing, next to Franky, the two of them discussing something about the oven in muted voices, while Brook stopped playing abruptly about five minutes ago and has been tuning his violin ever since.

"And that should be it.. finished!" Declares Usopp, tone satisfied, letting the screwdriver in his hand drop to the floor, belatedly hoping that it won't hit Zoro in the face. Thankfully, it doesn't. Franky looks up briefly, interest in his eyes, but returns to his own discussion quickly.

"Test it, test it!" Repeats Chopper excitedly from Usopp's shoulder, and the sniper grins proudly.

"I'll call Luffy, I haven't shown him yet! Or talked to him about it. Hey, Luffy, do you want to see something cool?" Calls Usopp. When no answer comes, his proud smile falters and drops until he's frowning in confusion. He looks towards Sunny's figurehead, where his captain had been last he saw him, and quickly checks with Observation Haki that Luffy hasn't dropped overboard. When he's confirmed that it didn't happen, he raises his voice again and calls, something like worry piercing through his voice: "Luffy?"

Silence, still. He calls again, and then a fourth time, each time raising his voice a little more: nothing. Everyone is looking towards the figurehead, now, except Zoro, still sleeping- or pretending to sleep, more likely.

Sighing, Usopp sends a pulse of Observation Haki towards Luffy, reinforcing it somewhat. He doesn't have Conqueror's, so he can't really impose his presence like Luffy does sometimes, but Luffy is attuned enough to his crewmates' Haki to sense the difference between passive Haki and intent. Of course he is. He's their captain.

Surely enough, just as Usopp is beginning to truly worry, and Chopper along with him, Luffy jumps out from behind the railing, hat in hand, and lands next to the wheel, where Jinbe is standing. He's smiling widely. The crew's heads go down and back to what they were doing. "What's going- oh, what's this, what's this!"

Luffy propels himself towards Usopp and Chopper, almost falling onto Zoro when he lands, eyes stuck on Usopp's new invention. When Usopp fails to answer him right away, he looks up with a question in his eyes.

"Luffy, are you hearing properly?" Asks Chopper, worry in his voice. "I didn't think about it, but you spend so much time next to explosions, maybe your eardrums are damaged or something-"

"What? I'm fine," frowns Luffy, confused. "I hear you just fine!"

Chopper looks skeptical, but Usopp just crosses his arms. "Well then, why didn't you answer when Usopp was calling you? That's rude, you know," calls Nami, standing next to her tangerine grove, leaves in her ponytail.

"Oh!" Says Luffy; just like that, his grin reappears. "I was thinking."

Usopp can _hear_ Nami frowning.

"Thinking about what, Captain?" Says one of Robin's mouth on the mast, and Luffy looks down on the hat he still holds in his hand, the surprisingly sturdy string attached to it dangling in the air.

There's a pause, as they wait for his answer.

"I was just thinking," says Luffy, smile still wide and eyes stuck on the part of his hat where Nami's clumsy first attempts at mending are, "I was just thinking that I'm glad I get to travel with you all."

The entire crew stops whatever they're doing.

(It's not _surprising._

Luffy has proven that he treasures them a thousand times over, with promises and reminders and wars. It's not surprising; it can't be.

That doesn't mean Usopp doesn't feel like he's been punched in the chest.)

And then Zoro, always the first to recover when faced with Luffy's terrible sincerity, scoffs and says "Well, of course. I'm going to be the best swordsman, I can hardly have a second-best captain."

"Yeah," mutters Sanji second, glaring at Zoro like it's the swordsman's fault they happen to agree on that one subject. "I mean, there wasn't any other idiot that was going to refuse my refusal. _Twice._ "

"I wouldn't travel alongside any other, Captain," murmurs Robin, and Brook just smiles, gentle, gentle, gentle.

And then-

"I never thanked you, you know," says Chopper, voice small.

Luffy tilts his head to look at his doctor.

"I mean, yes I did, but- you were the first friend I had," Chopper adds, still in the same tone. "And I never would have left Drum if you hadn't been there. You were- you were my first friend, and you chased me for hours to get me to come with you, which was scary, but- and I never thanked you, for taking me with you. For being my friend. I never- not really, I didn't."

"You don't have to thank us for being your friends, Chopper," says Nami, voice soft. Luffy, face unreadable, even to his crewmates, stands too still.

"No, I know," answers Chopper, and there's a smile in his voice, thank the Seas. "But I wanted to. I'm so _glad,_ that I get to do this. It's not- I don't think I'd be as happy, if I had stayed home."

"Chopper," says Luffy out of a sudden, sounding confused, "I wouldn't have left you in Drum. You couldn't have stayed."

And Chopper smiles, fond, nods easily, and answers: "Of course not, Captain. I had to be your doctor, after all."

Luffy nods at him, decisively.

"Exactly," he states, then smiles.

Silence falls onto Sunny, not uncomfortable, but still unusual in its suddenness. Usopp almost speaks, tries to fill it to avoid his thoughts, out of a habit that has begun in childhood and never really left. At the last moment, he refrains and instead, steps forward to lean into his captain's side, Luffy welcoming his presence easily.

It's Jinbe that finally speaks up, from his place behind the wheel:

"I believe I owe you a thank you, too."

(He doesn't. 

Jinbe had spent the first two weeks after his return apologizing to Luffy for taking so long to get back, until Luffy had looked at him, narrowed his eyes, and declared that _no matter where you are, you're still my helmsman, so it doesn't matter! Now stop apologizing!_

And Jinbe had complied, of course.)

Luffy looks up.

"I was- before I met you," he starts to say. "I was- lost, I believe, would be the word. Aimless. And you gave me a dream again, so- a thank you, I believe, is called for."

Luffy turns to face his helmsman, maneuvering Usopp out of the way gently. He tilts his head, eyebrows furrowed down.

"I didn't give you your dream, that's stupid," he states, and crosses his arms. "It wouldn't be your dream if I had decided it for you."

"He means you inspired him, Luffy," explains Nami quietly, but their miracle of a captain shakes his head stubbornly.

Usopp looks at Zoro, out of habit, just to see if their swordsman is lost or completely in synch with his captain; with him, it's one or the other. The man is smiling softly, a little mockingly maybe, eyes closed and swords sheathed at his side. There's nothing but quiet contentment on his face.

Usopp relaxes.

"It's _your_ dream," insists Luffy, arms still crossed, hat back on his back.

"Well, yes," says Jinbe. "It always has been. I just meant that I had forgotten about dreams being made reality, before you all came along."

Brook chuckles quietly.

"Yes, you tend to have that effect, Captain," he murmurs, and Franky nods along seriously. Robin smiles, a little melancholic.

"Oh," lets out Luffy. "That's fine, then. But your dreams should be your own." He scrunches his nose in distaste. "Sabo's parents didn't understand that, they were stupid."

The relative silence feels heavy suddenly. Or, not heavy, but important, somehow.

Usopp stays silent, and trusts someone else to say the right thing.

"How so?," finally asks Robin. Robin, the archeologist: the one that knows how to handle matters of the past with care and delicateness and get what she wants out of them.

"They just were," says Luffy. "But Sabo run away, so it didn't matter that much, and anyway I think his dream changed."

"Because he's fighting with the Revolutionaries?"

"Yeah," nods Luffy. "That's okay, I think Ace had changed too! 'Cause he wanted to be the captain, right? But then he went with Whitebeard, so he _wasn't_ captain."

(It's not that Ace isn't mentioned among them, because he is, sometimes. Always a little hesitantly, always with care, but his name isn't taboo. It's just that-

It's just that, among them all, they are only two who really knew Ace: Jinbe and Luffy. 

It's hard to talk about someone you never really knew, especially when doing so risks hurting one of their own. And- it's not like the rest of the crew talk about their ghosts readily, either. They aren't hidden, no, of course not, but none of them really like to dwell on the past, out of a fear to be weighted down maybe, so they don't.

It makes for a strange atmosphere when Luffy does linger on his past, even quickly.)

" _You_ won't change your dream, though," states Zoro, sure of himself, and Luffy shakes his head.

"Why would I? I'm the one that's going to be Pirate King. No one else."

"Others have the same dream," points out Usopp, amused, and Luffy shrugs, lets his crossed arms fall to his sides.

"Sure, but I'm the one that's going to do it."

He says it easily, like he doesn't fear fate going against him; like he doesn't care if it does, like he knows that even the order of world itself wouldn't be enough to stop him. The crew smiles around him.

"Of course you will, Captain," confirms Robin. "We'll help."

Luffy grins brightly at her.

"Yeah." He gestures nonsensically with his hands, and Usopp has to duck to avoid being hit, grinning all the while. "Ace worried, before he set sail, that I wouldn't find a good crew, or that I'd be alone, which would have _sucked._ But he was being stupid, because I have the best crew ever!"

He spreads his hands wide towards all of them, and Usopp's smile might be matching his captain's in terms of brightness.

"And Sabo kept saying, before he died- or, not-died, I guess- that we should learn how to cook, or navigate, or be _subtle,_ but he was wrong too!"

"Ah-" tries to say Jinbe, but Luffy interrupts him.

"They worried a lot about me. And I mean, I guess Sabo worries still, even though it's stupid because I'm _way_ stronger than when I was ten-"

"You're facing stronger enemies, too," points out Zoro, and Luffy stills and frowns.

"I guess," he says dejectedly, but dismisses the thought quickly. "They were still stupid to worry, because I found you all! So I'll be okay, no matter what!"

He stays silent after that, still smiling, and the whole crew looks out of breath, somehow.

(It's not surprising; it can't be. It _shouldn't_ be.

But Usopp's seen so many miracles already, and he _knows_ that you can't get used to them. Luffy's faith, Luffy's happiness, Luffy's love- well, it's a miracle of its own.

It blindsides even the best of them.

Usopp's okay with that.)

Chopper jumps to hug their captain.

Luffy laughs a little, and catches the reindeer easily, holding him tight. Then he releases his doctor, and unaware or uncaring of the stillness in the air, he turns to Usopp with eagerness in his eyes. Pointing to Usopp's hands, asks:

"That looks so cool, _Usopp,_ what does it do?"

Usopp catches his breath; the importance of the moment melts away; he laughs.

The world keeps on turning despite miracles.

**Author's Note:**

> Jinbe is a Strawhat, you cowards
> 
> (Luffy loves his crew but most importantly: his crew loves him)


End file.
